Groups Single Dialogs Workspace

Use this workspace to maintain access groups, which are collections of Maconomy users, often with similar jobs, who share the same access settings.

For example, you might have a group for salespeople, which gives access to the Maconomy areas that salespeople are likely to use.

A group's access settings determine which workspaces the group members can use and whether they have Read, New, Update, or Delete access to each of the windows.

A group consists of a number of lines, each of which defines the right to use four functions: Read, New, Update, and Delete in one window or potentially all windows.

You place Maconomy users into one or more groups, giving them automatic access to the windows that are relevant to their jobs. Use the Users window to assign users to groups.

The Window Layout Groups window also uses the groups that you create in this window because you can assign window layouts to each group. Each window layout contains information that defines the elements (fields, fixed texts, variables, and so on) that are to be displayed when a user opens a given window. Thus, the windows in Maconomy are only available to the user in the layouts that you define for the groups to which you assigned the user. You create the groups in this window, but you maintain the list of layouts that you assign to the group in the Window Layout Groups window. See the Window Layout Groups and Window Layouts windows for more information about the functionality of layouts.

If you have installed the Portal, groups are also linked to the role functionality in the Portal in that creating a group also causes a Portal role to be created and assigned to the new group. In the Portal island, you can define information that is specific to the role that you assign to the current group.

Maconomy's standard setup includes the Change Password and All Workspaces predefined groups. You cannot change these groups.

You select the windows to which a new group should have access in the Window Name or Internal Window Name field in the Windows sub-tab of this window, where you can find the relevant name and insert it by using the Find action in the Find menu. If you want the group to contain a line for each window, you can use the Create lines for all workspaces action. Using that action causes Maconomy to automatically insert all of the windows on the lines in this window. Next, you specify whether the users of the group should be able to open the windows in question and if so, whether they should have access to create entries, change existing entries, and delete entries in the windows in question.

If you do not define access rights for all of the lines that the Windows sub-tab displays, you can delete the lines for which you have not specified the Read, Create, Change, and Delete actions by using the Delete lines without access permission action.

You can also granted a group access to all windows if you leave the first field in a table line empty and you select the Unspecified pop-up type in the Window Type field. On such a line, you can then define the rights that the users of the group should have to all windows (a combination of the rights Read, Create, Change, and Delete). Even if you do this, you can still add lines for windows for which specific access rights should be given to the users who belong to the group. These lines then represent exceptions to the general rights on the line that has the value Unspecified.

You place users who have access to all Maconomy windows and functions in the All Windows group. If you want a more functional division of work routines, you can create several job-related groups. For example, you might create a sales group, and give its member users access to the Sales Orders module, the Item Information window in the Inventory module, and perhaps to the customer ledger windows in the Accounts Receivable module.

Note that for some windows, read access implies full access (that is, to create, update, and delete information). These windows are typically windows from which you can print documents-where the printout represents an action. These windows include all of the Delete windows; the Interest Selection, Reminder Selection, Approve Interest Selection, and Approve Reminder Selection windows in the Accounts Receivable module; the Payment Selection and Change Payment Selection by Vendor windows in the Banking module; the Print Picking List and Print Returns List windows in the Sales Orders module; the Item Purchase Selection window in the Item Purchase module; and the Change Price Lists window in the Inventory module.

To prevent users in a group from having access to the full functionality of those workspaces, you must ensure that the group has no access at all to them.

By default, Maconomy contains one user, Administrator, who has access to all windows and all functions. This access category is defined in the "All workspaces" group, which is supplied by Maconomy. The Administrator user is automatically assigned to all groups created in this window.

Note that when you create a group, Maconomy creates an entry for that group in the View Groups and Layout Groups windows. For more information about views and view groups, see the description of the View Groups window.

For auditing purposes, it is strongly recommended that you print and file your group information every time that you change it in this window. You can use the Print This function in the File menu.